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Player's Name: Hiccup
Contact info: [gmail] artemisian ; [aim] troperific ; spellcoats
DW: bellezza

Character: Merrill
Canon: Dragon Age
Version: canon
Canon Point:
Age: Late 20s ~ early 30s
Gender: Female

History: It's a Keeper's job to remember.

"The stories tell us that all elvhen once had the gift; but like so many things, it was lost. It's a Keeper's job to remember, to restore what we can."

As each generation passes, magic becomes more rare among the Dalish. As the gift dies out, talented children are moved between clans so that every Keeper has a successor, and no clan is in danger of being left without guidance.

Merrill was born to the Alerion clan, which wandered the hills of Nevarra. She was the third child of the clan with the ancient gift born to her--when the next Arlathvenn (gathering of the clans) occurred, she was given to the Sabrae clan to be First to Keeper Marethari. Merrill was just four years old.

She spent most of her life in Ferelden and the Korcari Wilds until her clan was driven north by the Blight.

Personality: Merrill is a young elf whose head seems to be perpetually trapped in the clouds. In a world as grim as Thedas is, Merrill's almost perpetually sunny perspective manages to find something to marvel at, whether it be a cloud in the shape of a griffin or her first time witnessing a mugging. She has a great, generous heart, and is kind even to those who treat her poorly - though not, at least, to a fault; standing up for herself and sticking by her guns is the impetus that causes her to join Hawke in Kirkwall in the first place. But she has difficulty fitting in, from a childhood of isolation from her peers to a city full of hostiles to being just plain weird even among weirdoes. Relating to people is difficult for her. Relating to history is easier.

Merrill's self-esteem issues begin in childhood, when she was given up by her parents at a young age to be devoted to a life as her people's history, culture, and their very livelihood. The message such a thing sends to a young, impressionable child is momentous: all of Merrill's worth is bound up in this role as the guardian of Dalish heritage. The Dalish way of life reinforces that: the almost religious reverence the People have for historical artifacts, the great honor and prestige given to Keepers and storytellers.

Then Tamlen died and Mahariel was conscripted into the Wardens rather than die as well. Merrill could not even protect her people; the only way she could be a worthy Keeper would be if she could protect their culture. Blood magic, to that end, is a tool to Merrill, morally relative and no better or worse than any other. There are no good spirits and bad demons, only spirits as diverse and as dangerous as any sentient being.

You know the phrase "the road to hell is paved with good intentions"? Merrill has all the best of intentions: her driving motivation is to save her people by saving whatever scraps of their heritage she can. Unfortunately she is blinded by her short-sightedness and her pride. Merrill fully accepts that she could become her own casualty, and she takes steps to ensure that, if she becomes an abomination, someone will be on hand to kill her. And her terrible self-worth is her undoing again, in that she fails to see that someone could love her enough to save her from her self-destruction, whether she wants their salvation or no. She is abominably stubborn, for good or ill.

All she ever wanted was to help.

All she got was blood on her hands.

Fears:
Failing her people: Merrill has made saving her people's heritage her defining purpose in life and is terrified of failing, to the point of rationalizing some of the fallout from her choices as being because other people were foolish, not because her choices were wrong.

Isolation/abandonment: Given away at a young age, having trouble connecting with people, ultimately being rejected and reviled by her clan; it's no wonder Merrill fears being alone.

Becoming an abomination: Possession and mutation into an abomination is a very real fear all mages must live with, but for Merrill the reality is even more dangerous: she converses with demons, consorts with them, and must maintain constant vigilance to ensure she never falls. Or, if she does, that someone will kill her before she can hurt anyone.

Weaknesses:
Pride is Merrill's primary weakness, typified in the game by the Pride demon she consorts with in her quest to fix the mirror, and the separate Pride demon that tempts her in a separate quest that brings Hawke into the Fade. Merrill wants to save her people, but she wants it to be her that saves them. Her drive to prove herself twists into a need to prove all those who ever doubted her wrong. Pride is her achilles heel, it is her fatal flaw, and before the fall it goeth, as they say.

Physicality: As a mage, Merrill is also rather physically inept - moreso even than most mages because she is a complete klutz. Her sense of direction is absurd in how bad it is; in trying to get from a lowtown pub to her house she can somehow wind up in the viscount's airing cupboard. Also, the game never actually addresses this, but she is more than likely anemic from all the blood magic (though using blood magic does explicitly draw on her own health for power).

Self-esteem: It is pretty much crap and tied to feelings of poor self-worth and fear of failure.

Mundane Strengths/Abilities:
An almost preternatural ability to get herself lost. That aside, nothing especially.

Sensitivity/Magical Ability:
As a mage, Merrill has a natural connection to the Fade, the realm of dreams and spirits from which magic originates. Some spirits of the Fade are benign, but not all - and there are many that seek a path to the mortals' world. For such spirits, mages like Merrill are like a beacon, their spirits and bodies a bridge between the Fade and the material world. The more powerful the mage, the greater the allure. Mages walk a fine line, living in a perpetual state of temptation they must hold back.

Some mages even consort with demons, walk with them, and learn from them secret powers and magics - such as blood magic. Merrill is a blood mage, an art she's learned through deals with demons, an art feared throughout Thedas for the ease with which mages abuse it. She can draw power from her own blood and others, with or without their consent; she can control bodies and minds. She also has a strong affinity with nature and nature-aligned magics from being apprenticed to a Keeper. However, unlike many other mages, Merrill has no access to the Creation school of spells and therefore cannot heal except by the use of blood magic.

Supply List:
- armor and robes
- staff
- small cache of lyrium potions and first-aid kits
- a Sylvanwood Ring and a small wooden carving of a halla

Game Transfers: n/a

Sample RP post:
The cave stopped being so eerie the third or fourth time around.

Merrill has grown used to it. The dim half-life sneaking through cracks in the rock, like some cautious creature sniffing for danger. The smell of must and moist and moss and other m-lettered things, mixed into a rich, earthy perfume spiced with the smell of rot. The tiny drip drip drip of water on stone mingling with the quiet whisper of air moving through stale spaces. Sometimes the whisper becomes a quiet moan.

But during her third or fourth visit Merrill discovered that if she tilts her head to the left just so and lets her eyes drift closed in a dreamy sort of way, the sounds become more of a lullaby. The light looks a bit like it does sifting into the aravel at dawn. The smell--

Well, halla smell worse.

It's all a matter of perspective, really.

She settles into her usual spot before the statue, on a dry-ish bit of the moss carpeting the cold stone floor. Tucks her feet beneath her thighs for warmth and lets her body relax, bone by bone, muscle by muscle, cell by cell, until she feels each whisper of the air through her skin.

You return. Audacity's voice slips into her mind, quiet as silk. I feared your Keeper would not let you.

"She's my mentor, not my mother," Merrill says, feeling waspish at that barb. But she takes the still air and draws it into herself, calming her irritation. It is true Marethari would keep Merrill away if she could, but short of commanding the vines and trees to tie her up and bind her, she cannot stop where Merrill goes.

The stones seem to creak - the spirit, chuckling to itself. Too true, little one. And it seems I made you a promise last we met, did I not? Have you thought it over?

"Yes," Merrill answers. Her voice sounds steelier than she feels.

Then do as I instruct. Take the knife you carry in your boot and cut your hand.

She draws from her boot the small ironwood dagger fashioned by Master Ilen for her twelfth birthday and studies it. He would so disapprove if he knew what she was using it for. Nerves flutter in her gut, but she forces them down. She will do this. She will. Merrill presses the blade's edge to palm, takes a deep breath, and draws it across.

The knife bites into her skin, harsh and iron. Merrill flinches. What am I doing? she thinks, suddenly aghast, and Hush, child, the spirit croons, steeling her. Visions of that long-lost empire, the glittering elvhen cities, flash through her mind. Do you feel it?

Blood wells up from the cut, hot and thick and so very red. The color transfixes Merrill; her world narrows down to the sight of it, the sleek grey-brown of her knife, and the sound of her breath rushing fast and heavy down her throat. She swallows. Her tongue feels too thick.

And then she feels it singing from her blood.

Power.